


anchors in darkness

by shishiswordsman



Series: an alliance is like friendship, right? (10 days of lawlu 2018) [3]
Category: One Piece
Genre: 10 days of LawLu, Established Relationship, Hurt/Comfort, Luffy Being Luffy, M/M, Nightmares, Post-Dressrosa, Sleepy Cuddles
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-03
Updated: 2018-06-03
Packaged: 2019-05-17 18:54:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,478
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14837279
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shishiswordsman/pseuds/shishiswordsman
Summary: Luffy wakes up to a fist in his face.Written for 10 days of LawLu 2018, day 7: Light/Dark





	anchors in darkness

Luffy wakes up to a fist in his face.

He'd been in deep sleep, dreaming about mermen and some big monster, but all drowsiness is quickly wiped away by adrenaline. He sits up in a rush, some primal instinct telling him that he’s in a fight, so his jaw’s set and hands are fisted when he blinks sleep from his eyes. The punch had landed on the corner of his eye, and it had hurt — not much, but enough that Luffy lifts a hand to his face as he peers at the room. He can’t sense anyone or see anything threatening, and yet he’s been attacked.

It takes him a moment to realise why.

Beside him, Law shivers and shakes, his entire face scrunched up with what looks like sheer terror. His knuckles are coated with a flickering layer of black. Suddenly it all clicks for Luffy. Law's having a nightmare, and his frightened throes are what woke Luffy up. Law mutters something in his sleep, a word Luffy _almost_ recognises but doesn’t with how muffled against the pillow it is. Law says that word again and again, more frantically than before. His head whips to the side, and Luffy can see his eyes move wildly behind his closed lids.

Luffy leans closer to him, putting his hand gently on his lover's shoulder. “Oi, Law, you gotta wake up.” Shaking Law gingerly only gets him punched again as Law's entire frame stiffens. A muffled whine builds in his throat, and Luffy does the only thing he can think of as Law’s eyes refuse to open.

“Law, wake up!” he says more firmly. Then he slaps Law in the face.

Suddenly, Law sits up with a shout, and Luffy's thrown off the bed. He hits the wall with a soft 'oomf', and it doesn't hurt. The wounded, scared look in Law's eyes does hurt, though.

“What? Luffy…” Law mumbles.

"You had a bad dream," Luffy tells him, tries to sound normal because the last thing Law needs is someone babying him. "We're on the Sunny. It wasn’t real."

Law seems to hear him, and he brings his palms to his forehead, pushing against his skull with the heels of his hands. Then, he lets out a groan and falls back on the bed. Luffy stands up and walks over to the bed. "Can I join you?" he asks tentatively. He’s learned the hard way that sometimes Law doesn’t like to be close to anyone after a nightmare.

This time, Law simply mumbles something that vaguely resembles Luffy's name, and then an arm shoots out to grab Luffy's wrist and pulls him to the bed on top of Law. Luffy grins a bit when he lands, but he stops grinning when Law rolls away from him, turning his back to Luffy. Instead, his lips bunch together, and he nudges Law's back with a careful poke. "Bad one?"

"Yeah," comes Law's reply, his voice rough with sleep and coarse enough to grate against Luffy's ears. "Bad one."

Luffy doesn't really know what to say to that. Whenever he has nightmares, Law holds him close and tells him to breathe, tells him it's not real and that he's safe. Sometimes he starts talking about Luffy's nakama. It's supposed to be an anchor, Law’s told him, and Luffy doesn't really get that since there's an anchor outside, and he doesn't have nightmares about anchors, but —

None of that really matters. He can talk about anchors, if that's what Law needs.

"Anchors are nice." He can't see Law's face when he says that, but he feels him move a bit on the bed, as if jerking in surprise. He knows Law's listening, so he continues. "Anchors are nice because they keep us in place while we sleep, yanno? That way we don't have to take shifts manning the Sunny, that'd suck. Like if half the crew had to sail during the day and the other half sailed during the night. I like it when we can all do adventures together and stuff."

Law huffs out a breath that sounds like something caught between a laugh and a sigh, and Luffy grins when he says, "You're taking the concept of anchors too seriously, Luffy-ya."

"Whatever," Luffy dismisses him. He moves slowly closer to Law, and Law allows him to roll him over so that they're facing again. "You ok?"

"I will be," Law assures, and he pulls Luffy closer to him. When his arms wrap around Luffy's body, they're shaking, clammy with cold sweat. "I'm sorry if I scared you."

“Bad dreams suck," Luffy oh-so eloquently agrees.

Law nods, and Luffy can see he really wants to roll his eyes at him. "Hence why they're called 'bad' dreams."

"True..." Luffy pulls his arm from under Law's body so that he can cup his allied captain's chin, can make Law face him. "You know it was fake, right? You weren't actually there, your mind just wanted you to think you are.”

"I do." Law shifts so he can take Luffy's hand in his, the one that was cupping his chin. He presses a kiss on Luffy's knuckles.

"So, you want to talk about it?"

"Not especially. It... I haven't had that particular dream since Zou," Law tells him. _Since Dressrosa, since Mingo_ , Luffy corrects for him in his mind. "I dreamt I — that I lost people, drove them away and it caught me off guard."

"I kind of gathered from the way you punched me awake," Luffy says, his tone chipper but sympathetic. "It's over now, anyway, so we can get some more sleep."

"I hit you?”

Luffy stretches out his cheek, grins and says, "Don't worry about it. I'm rubber, didn't hurt one bit!"

"I thank the seas for that," Law says, and now he's smiling a bit too. He still looks too pale and too shaken for Luffy to relax entirely, but he's not sweating anymore and his eyes have light in them again. This is much better. Encouraged, Luffy brushes his lips against Law's, and he grins when he presses one more kiss to each corner of Law's mouth.

"You know, if you don't wanna sleep anymore, we could always go raid the kitchen."

"I _could_ use a cup of coffee," Law agrees. When he gets up, he sways a little, and Luffy steadies him by stretching an arm to wrap around around his waist. Law swats his hands away, and Luffy watches as he stumbles to the dresser — or at least the patch of floor that had received the questionable honour of serving as the dresser last night.

He starts rummaging around for his own shorts, because apparently running around naked isn’t very chivalrous. The leftover adrenaline from his sudden wake up is still thrumming under his skin, and Luffy’s attention strays to Law every few seconds.

Law doesn't have nightmares as often as he used to, anymore, not after Dressrosa's fall and the sleeping pills Luffy knows he takes sometimes when the stress of their lives gets too much. The last few weeks have been hard on them all, though; the weather more unpredictable and volatile than they’re used to even in the New World. Law has been sleeping heavier than usual as a result, and it’s a double-edged sword he just got stabbed with.

It occurs to Luffy then, as he puts his sandals on and grabs his hat from a nail above the bed frame, that he remembers this dream. At least he thinks he does, because something’s just clicked in his mind and reminded him of something Law’d mutter in his sleep when he was still new on the Sunny; Caesar’s keeper and a Shichibukai allied with the Straw Hats on their journey to Green Bit.

Luffy runs up to Law and takes his hand in his. Swinging their hands back and forth, Luffy smiles at Law, waits for him to meet his eyes before he says: “Your family’s right here, Torao.

That seems to be the right thing to say, because some invisible stiffness leaks away from the sharp edges of Law’s body. And even though Law says nothing in reply, he squeezes Luffy’s hand. The sun is rising in the horizon, and Luffy can sense Sanji shuffling in the bathroom. That means that they have about fifteen minutes before Sanji will go to the kitchen, and that’s plenty of time.

He grins and tugs on Law’s hand, spurring him to move faster. “C’mon, you can walk faster than that. Sanji’s up already.”

“Or we could just wait for breakfast,” Law suggests, but they both know he knows Luffy better than that. Luffy laughs, a bit louder than what’s probably wise for stealth purposes, and the two captains rush into the galley just as the first beams of sunlight starts washing away the darkness from the deck.

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading!


End file.
